A website that lists the victims of Righthaven LLC 'shakedown' lawsuits that are causing irreparable harm to bloggers and advocacy websites.

Righthaven LLC -- a bottom feeding legal outfit -- has teamed up with the Las Vegas Review-Journal and Denver Post to sue mom and pop websites, advocacy and public interest groups and forum board operators for copyright infringement. The strategy of Righthaven is to sue thousands of these website owners, who are primarily unfunded and will be forced to settle out of court.

To date Righthaven has been ordered to pay $323,138 in legal fees and sanctions.

Friday, July 22, 2011

The day Dawson dismissed that suit, July 13, Righthaven simply filed a new suit over the same alleged infringement against Mostofi. Only this time, Righthaven says its standing to sue is bullet-proof as it has obtained complete control of the copyright at issue with the latest amendments to the Stephens Media lawsuit contract, called the Strategic Alliance Agreement (SAA).
That contention is false, attorneys in another case involving the Pahrump Life blog charged in a new court filing this week.
“The restated SAA seeks to perpetuate, in fact, to revitalize Righthaven’s fraud by denying its victims the dismissals of Righthaven’s claims that they deserve,” said the filing by attorneys including Laurence Pulgram.

Blogger Ken recently highlighted parts of CALA's request to file amicus brief in the claim against Leland Wolf. (CALA is also a friend of the court in the Pahrump Life and DU cases.) Another part of the motion addresses Righthaven's continuous re-filing of claims with an amended SAA.

However, there is a much deeper, much more fundamental problem with Righthaven's standing, one wholly unrelated to the Copyright Act. CALA's amicus brief presents arguments and authorities that conclusively demonstrate—as a matter of black letter law—that Righthaven's assignments are void ab initio and no amendments could ever rescue them. The CALA brief presents a way for this Court and others to conclusively resolve these issues with permanence, which will save Righthaven defendants from endlessly defending themselves against rewritten agreements.

Also, U.S. District Judge Howard McKibben in Reno dismissed a Righthaven lawsuit against a “Ben Jones”, after Righthaven served the wrong Ben Jones with the lawsuit -- and failed to show it had served the correct Ben Jones with the suit. That claim was originally filed over a year ago.